On the simplest view of a "checking theory", all the features of an inflected verb float aruond in one pot (unordered set) of features. As the verb raises to functional heads in the syntax, it matches and checks features from this pot with the features of the functional heads to which it adjoins. Affixation in the lexicon prior to lexical insertion would provide the inflected verb with all the features for its pot but would not impose any particular structure on the organization of these features.
- Halle & Marantz (2004), a pag.432